A Restorative Triumph After the Bomb Blasts

BOSTON — The white T-shirts said 4.15 Strong on the front and Survivor on the back.

On a restorative day after last year’s tragedy at the Boston Marathon, no runners showed more resilience than a group of 28 who were injured in the bomb blasts and ran Monday as a form of therapy and a show of hardiness and defiance.

“It feels like we’ve taken something back,” Dave Fortier, 49, a co-founder of the group, 4.15 Strong, said after he completed the marathon in 3 hours 59 minutes 17 seconds.

Several members of 4.15 Strong, which refers to the date of the 2013 bombing, had not run a marathon before.

Eliza Gedney, 25, of Stamford, Conn., at first considered the idea to be far-fetched. She was not much for physical exercise. But Gedney, who received shrapnel in her legs and back during the first bomb blast, said running helped ease her depression, her fear of going outside and her anxiety in crowds.

“Running improves my mood, just being able to leave my house,” Gedney said just before Monday’s marathon, which she completed in 4:33:21. “It got me to the gym and made me comfortable in the streets.”

The group gathered at the senior center in Hopkinton, Mass., before the start and began running one and a half hours after the elite runners began their race of 26.2 miles back to Boston.

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One year after the Boston Marathon bombing, Meb Keflezighi, 38, became the first American man to win the race since 1983 and the oldest winner since at least 1930.CreditBrian Snyder/Reuters

While Boston Strong had become the mantra for this year’s race, those in the 4.15 Strong group stressed to a reporter who ran among them that they had complicated feelings about returning to the finish line area. Three people were killed there and more than 260 were injured last April 15, including burns, shrapnel wounds, broken bones and hearing loss endured by the running team members.

Last Tuesday, on the first anniversary of the bombing, Lee Ann Yanni, 32, a co-founder of the running group, said she became sick to her stomach and began crying as she saw the bleachers and photographer’s bridge erected again at the finish line on Boylston Street.

A physical therapist, Yanni had been standing near the finish a year ago, when the first bomb blast fractured her left fibula and damaged muscles and nerves in the leg.

“It’s funny how your body realizes what day it is,” Yanni said. She said she was excited but somewhat nervous on Monday, but added: “I want a different feeling about Boylston Street. It’ll probably be the safest place.”

The start was jubilant and the early miles expectant. Many runners said they were not interested in their times, just a shared experience. Amby Burfoot, the winner of the 1968 Boston Marathon, began handing out “thank you” cards to spectators along on the course.

“We love you all,” the cards said. “Thanks for giving us the thrill(s) of a lifetime.”

Beverly Fergus, 52, of Stoughton, Wis., who was running near the finish when last year’s race was halted, returned with 200 silver charms inscribed with “Love” that she planned to give to police officers and other emergency medical workers.

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Rita Jeptoo of Kenya won the women’s division in a record 2:18:57.CreditBrian Snyder/Reuters

“We’ll never forget what they did,” Fergus, a fitness instructor, said Sunday.

There were the usual funny signs on the course: “Toenails are for Sissies,” “I do marathons on Netflix” and “The Kenyans are drinking all the beer.” Outside a house near the start, a group of men jokingly offered beer, doughnuts and cigarettes to the runners.

But there was a fragile emotion in the heat and the relentless sun, reminders of catastrophe and heightened vigilance. Some runners wore shirts in honor of Martin Richard, the 8-year-old boy who died near the finish line. Military police in fatigues offset the Day-Glo uniforms of the runners.

There was a sense that something fundamental had changed, but also a feeling of reclamation and hopefulness, of a page being turned, of running ahead to keep from always having to mournfully and fearfully look back.

“I thought it would be really cool to flip the meaning of the day,” Samantha Carney, 31, of Cambridge, Mass., a member of the 4.15 Strong group, said five miles into Monday’s marathon, her first. Carney, who sustained temporary hearing loss when the second bomb exploded outside a restaurant, finished this year’s race in 6:07.52.

She had considered leaving town for the week, but added, “Instead, it seemed cool to run toward the city instead of away.”

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The law enforcement presence this year was twice as large.CreditAndrew Burton/Getty Images

At 2:49 p.m., the time the first bomb exploded, there was only cheering and the ringing of cowbells on Monday early in the infamous Newton hills. “Chafe now, brag later,” read one sign.

Yanni said she forgot about the moment, adding, “I was just trying to put one foot in front of the other to get to the finish line.”

The 4.15 Strong group sprung out of an offer by the Boston Athletic Association, which organizes the marathon, for survivors to enter the 2014 race. When the group began training in December, it met outside a running store just yards from the finish line where the first bomb exploded.

“Just to get the elephant out of the room,” said Fortier, 49, who owns a telecommunications company in Newburyport, Mass.

When Yanni reached that point Monday, she said that she and her husband, Nick, held hands to the finish in 5:47.05. “I wanted to take that time just to know it’s a different year now,” Yanni said. “It’s all about reclaiming the finish line for yourself.”

Fortier, whose right foot was lacerated by shrapnel and who sustained hearing loss in the first blast, said he was so stunned then that he did not realize he finished the race until he was in a hospital.

On Monday, Fortier said he stopped and said a prayer when he again reached the site of the blast, where a small memorial paid tribute to those who died.